Many vehicles today comprise systems which monitor the motion and the dynamics of the vehicle, for instance in the field of navigational applications (navigational systems) and security related systems. Examples for such vehicles are cars, trucks, ships, boats and planes.
Especially in the fields of street traffic, applications come from the field of security-related applications, for instance from the field of systems improving the active and/or the passive security of cars and trucks. Among the systems improving the active security of cars electronic driving aids, such as anti-blocking systems (ABS) and other dynamic drive control systems employed in modern cars. In the field of systems improving the passive security of cars, systems protecting the security and health of the passengers, e.g. the system for initiating the air bags, belong to the group of systems monitoring the dynamics and motions of the car.
Whenever such a system detects and recognizes a critical driving situation, for instance based on the motion of the car, the respective system is initiated and responds accordingly to fully prevent the critical situation or to minimize the consequences of such a situation (e.g. initiating the air bag in the case of a crash). Other applications comprise the general need to monitor and to detect the driving state of a car for controlling the driving stability (DSC=Dynamic Stability Control) and to control other security systems.
To fully monitor and to detect the motional state and the dynamics of an object both the linear accelerations with respect to three directions in space and the angular velocities or rotational rates with respect to the three directions or axes should be monitored and detected to achieve the full measurement of the motional state of the object.